As a fellow small business owner for several years, I know that finding enough time to do everything can be quite challenging. There simply aren’t enough hours in the day. I am always searching for a way to make my life easier. This is when I discovered user-generated content.

User generated content is a very cheap and highly effective online marketing tool. Google, and other search engines, are always on the lookout for high quality content, and media is no exception. The more engaging, relevant content you have, the more Google will reward you with organic traffic and higher search rankings.

Most customers trust fellow customers long before they trust a company. So, get your loyal customers to talk about your product or services. Have them talk about their experience with your company, how they made the purchase decision, or what they love about your product or service. This should resonate naturally with your target audience.

Gathering video content from your users is relatively easy. You simply install a video capture tool on your website, like the video record button from Vidrack. Then your users can submit video directly to you for your review. All you need to do is curate and share the best content on your site or via social media.

If you have a particularly active audience, you can do this as a simple request, or you can create a campaign with incentives for your users. Incentivization is an excellent way to increase the number of people who submit videos to you. You can offer a discount on future orders, premium services or products, or you can create a video contest.

Video contests are a very effective way to get a lot of people engaging with your company. The best part is, you often spend less on the prizes then if you were to give each person 5% off. A great way to make it easy for people to submit content is to pick a seasonal or trendy theme, so it will fit in with activities they might be doing anyway. For more on running a successful video content, check out this blog post.

The most brilliant part about all of this is that your audience will have some fun (and maybe take home some prizes) while generating content for you to use, and re-use, for future campaigns, research publications, testimonials, and more. A true win-win situation.

Have you tried a UGC campaign yet? Have questions on getting started? Let us know in the comments below!